Is there a "curse" on Colorado?

Everyone knows that America has a problem with gun violence and mass murders, but Colorado in particular has become the epicenter of it. In addition to the Columbine massacre, arguably the most famous and iconic mass shooting of all time, the state has weathered a rash of spree killings on top of it - at Platte Canyon High School, at the YWAM and New Life churches, at Deer Creek Middle School, and most recently, at the Aurora Mall - not to mention the Sikh shooter in Wisconsin, who had Colorado ties. Over the past 15 years, there has been a rampage in Colorado on average once every 2.5 years, more than any other state has experienced. Every 2.5 years, the bullets fly in Colorado, the world watches in horror, and the nation asks in vain, "why?" But after five major shootings in 15 years, the nation's collective "why?" has turned into "Colorado again?" The Denver metro area is now home to a higher concentration of mass murderers than any other highly populated area in the nation, and frankly I find that terrifying.

Equally disturbing is how calculating, heavily armed, ambitious, absurdly prepared, and over-the-top psychotic Colorado's killers are. The Virginia Tech shooter, lethal as he was, was only armed with a pair of low-powered pistols and a few hundred rounds of ammo. The Columbine gunmen, by contrast, had far more exotic weapons: sawed-off shotguns, a TEC-DC9 assault pistol, and bombs of all shapes and sizes practically spilling out of every orifice. Had everything gone as planned, the death toll at Columbine could have been in the hundreds, if not thousands. Similarly, the YWAM/New Life and Aurora shooters stockpiled thousands of rounds of ammunition, automatic rifles, and both had bombs in their homes. Like their precursors at Columbine, they both intended to kill hundreds and carry out the deadliest rampage in U.S. history, but fortunately did not succeed. Anders Breivik, the Complete Monster from Norway, currently holds the worldwide record for most kills in a shooting spree, but any one of Colorado's gunmen easily could have outdone him. That’s the key distinguishing trait of Colorado gunmen – while most spree shooters are armed with a .22 pistol, a few extra rounds, and go into it wearing jeans and a T-shirt, Colorado shooters build bombs, booby-trap their cars and homes, and wield obscene amounts of firepower and heavy assault weapons. Shooters here for some reason are compelled to go the extra mile.

The question now is, why Colorado? How could a state with so much going for it, so much natural beauty, such good weather, so many friendly and healthy people, be home to so much evil and violence? It used to be that Colorado was synonymous with skiing, outdoor activities, and sunshine, but now, to most of the world, Colorado is synonymous with tragedy and mass murder. Does God hate Colorado? Is it something in the air (or lack thereof)? Are we raising monsters here? Is the entire state a giant Indian burial ground? Is there a curse on Colorado? Is it on some convergence of time and space that draws in heavily armed sociopaths like the Bermuda Triangle to lost ships? I wouldn't be concerned if this was going on in California or New York, because more people obviously equals more crime. Colorado is not a heavily populated state, which makes me think that our person-to-monster ratio is far above the national average. I love living here and I am saddened and angry that my state is slowly transforming into the Middle East. Coloradans are a proud and wonderful people and we don't deserve to be repeatedly victimized like this. Chicago politicians have acknowledged that their city has a higher murder rate than even Baghdad and have taken steps to make changes. Maybe Colorado's leaders should follow suit, recognize that their state has a mass murder epidemic, and do something about it.

1. I don't believe in curses.....except for that ladder thing.

2. Not to make light of the state I reside in, but....

....the altitude may have something to do with it. The effects of hypoxia are different for different people and can affect people even at the relatively "low" altitude of 5500 - 6000'. I can't say the same for the Wisconsin knucklehead, but having lower thresholds for oxygen debt may be one of the factors.

6. The natives of Tibet....

...have lived there for thousands of years and have physiologically adapted to the high terrain. Us, big, broad chested Americans have only recently settled in high country for a couple of hundred years and are probably more susceptible to the effects of altitude than others who've lived in that rarified air.

The Granby bulldozer in which Marvin Heemeyer had a beef with the city council so he put armour on his bulldozer and destroyed the town. (Luckily there were no deaths other than Marvin who killed himself.)

So why do these happen? Could it be the same reason that there are more suicides in the less-populated western states. There just isn't the social structure to keep people well grounded. The convergence-of-time-and-place argument could also play a role. At this time in Colorado's history, we are having growing pains. Again, the lack of social stability plays a role in this. People see buildings going up where there was once open spaces (The Granby guy had a touch of this problem). Obviously, the pressures that our young people are facing is a major problem. The Columbine killers, the Aurora shooter and the Deer Creek Middle school shooting all were cases where the shooters were being treated for mental problems.